Tanwen is the main female character in my Dark Ages vampire novel, SAINT SANGUINUS.
The daughter of the local chieftain, she was betrothed to warrior Peredur until he fell to a spear upon the battlefield.
For today's post, meet Tanwen in this excerpt:
Tanwen
clapped both hands over her mouth. Her shaky breathing filled the hut as she
realized Peredur truly lay at her father’s front door.
“Tanwen,” he whispered. He
regained his feet then reached a hand to her. “Come away.”
She looked back toward her sisters, at
her brother curled by the fire, at her parents under the covers. So odd that
none had awakened. Plucking a cloak from a peg on the wall, Tanwen wrapped it
about herself, pushing aside the door flap to stride outside into the cold
night.
Her Peredur swept her up in his
arms, running easily for a spell until he brought them far into the woods and
out of the numbing wind. She clung to him, marveling at his solidness.
How it hurt to be separated as
he set her down on an overturned tree. He knelt before her on the thin
powdering of snow. Tanwen clutched the woolen cloak tightly, her breath
frosting white in the air between them.
“I was told...” she tried.
Reaching forward to touch his cheek, a part of her recoiled at the whisper of
death she found there.
Her beloved brought his hand up
to cover hers. “Here I am,” he said at last.
“But Cynfelyn,” she said. “He
saw you fall. To a spear.”
Peredur looked away.
“How did you survive it?” she
said, a tinge of fear underneath her words. She pulled her hand back, away from
his face.
“I didn’t,” he said simply,
lifting his head to look her straight in the eye.
What
could he mean? He was right here, solid and in
front of her.
“I did fall to a spear.” He
lifted his tunic but there was no scar from the wound. His flesh was white as a
corpse. She covered her mouth with her hand, but the shriek of pure panic
escaped her.
“I am no longer a man, Tanwen.”
Tears poured down her face. Why stop them?
“I did not survive that battle.
Cynfelyn was right to tell you what he did. I am no longer the Peredur who grew
up here in this village.”
“Why have you taken me here?”
she asked, noticing the remoteness surrounding them as if for the first time.
“I wanted to tell you I love
you.”
What he had never actually said
to her in his life as an ordinary man, he said to her now as if that would help
their plight. It just made her angry.
“Why did you go off to fight,
Peredur?” She no longer felt the need to hide her pain at being second-best after
the adventure of war.
He looked away from her. “I
wanted to make a proper home. For you.”
Tears dripped from her nose and
chin. He held his arms out and she fell into them. It felt good to sob, Peredur
caressing her hair, nuzzling her face.
“I was visited upon the
battlefield as I lay dying,” he said at last. “My curses brought him, Tanwen. I
knew I’d never get a chance to do what we’re doing right now.” He could barely
form the words. “So I cursed God.”
She pushed back from his
embrace. “What are you saying, Peredur?” An unbearable pit of dread formed in
her chest.
“I cursed Him as I lay dying,”
he said. “I should have prayed and asked for forgiveness, but I didn’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“I am doomed.”
“Doomed? What do you mean?” she asked, hearing the lunatic edge to
her voice. “Tell me!” She let go of him, and the loss of him even for a moment
took her breath away.
He sat down heavily, seeming
faint all of a sudden. “I live by drinking the living blood of people, Tanwen.”
He bared his teeth, exposing two long fangs like wolf’s teeth.
She
couldn’t stop her gasp that seemed to pierce him. “I use them to get to the
blood,” he said, a look of despair clouding his beautiful face. “I must feed
soon. I must leave you or I will feed upon your family. And I won’t be able to
stop myself.”
Copyright - Julia Phillips Smith - 2011
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